


Counting Blessings

by arabmorgan



Category: Produce 101 (TV), Wanna One (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, M/M, Some Humor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-06
Updated: 2018-07-06
Packaged: 2019-05-30 08:39:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 8,805
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15093167
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/arabmorgan/pseuds/arabmorgan
Summary: Woojin was only looking for a place to puke, not for a god to follow him home.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Could be pre-slash or whatever you want to read it as, I honestly have no idea. (I think it's a trend, me never actually knowing what's going on in my fics.) Please excuse my attempts at being funny OTL

Frankly, Woojin had never really imagined his first clubbing experience to consist of downing about three shots in total, before getting the mother of all headaches in fifteen minutes flat, and then having to be helped out of the building by his dance club senior. Talk about humiliating.

“– be back in a moment,” Seongwoo was all but yelling into his phone, right by Woojin’s ear, presumably because whoever was on the other side of the line couldn’t quite hear him over the pounding bass inside. “Just getting the kid some fresh air.”

“I’m not drunk,” Woojin insisted valiantly, words slurring ever so slightly as he tried to shrug his way out from under Seongwoo’s arm.

“Jesus, you really can’t hold your alcohol, can you?” Seongwoo laughed, steadying Woojin against a lamppost by the entrance. “You know what, I’m just going to send you back first. Stay here while I go and let the others know. Dumbasses probably won’t be able to hear their phones ringing anyway.”

Woojin squinted at Seongwoo, grabbing for the older man’s arm and missing spectacularly. “But I’m _fine_ ,” he insisted, although his words sounded distinctly whiny. “It’s just, my head really hurts.”

“ _Stay here_ , kid,” Seongwoo repeated with a chuckle, before leaving Woojin to die an ignominious death on the pavement. His head felt like it was about to split with every beat of his heart, and the alcohol swirling around his stomach seemed to be threatening to revolt against his digestive system.

Yeah, he definitely needed to puke.

Pushing away from the light, Woojin stumbled to the side of the building, eyes darting about the dimness of the alley for a drain, a trashcan, _anything_ to spew the contents of his stomach into. After all, at the core of him, Woojin was a pleasant boy who had been raised to have consideration for others, which included not vomiting on the pavement just so some poor street cleaner would have to clean up his mess the next morning.

 _Voila_ , he thought with relief, spotting a conveniently-placed bucket tucked against the side of the brick wall. He sank to his knees before it with all the grace of an inebriated dancer, grabbed the rim with both hands, and promptly filled it with a horrifyingly watery mixture of stomach acid, vodka and Red Bull. He gasped, spat a couple of times into the bucket, and then groaned as another stream of puke heaved itself out of his body.

“What the hell are you _doing_?” came a sudden panicked screech right by Woojin’s ear, before he found himself being pulled bodily backwards by the collar of his shirt, and getting half-choked in the process.

Woojin wheezed when his mysterious assailant hauled him around and pushed him up against the wall in a way that was far more terrifying than he had ever imagined any of his wall-related activities to be. He felt marginally more clear-headed after his bout of vomiting, but that didn’t change the fact that he had no idea what was going on. Was he being mugged? Being initiated into a cult? Or had someone just found his face offensive?

Shaking his head slightly to clear his vision, Woojin couldn’t help raising his brows at the unexpected sight before him – a blonde, baby-faced boy glaring daggers at him, one hand still fisted in the front of Woojin’s shirt, the sleeves of his over-sized pink sweater bunched up at his elbows.

All in all, not a particularly intimidating sight.

“ _So_?” the boy demanded, looking unreasonably mad for someone who was so, well, _soft_ -looking.

Woojin blinked. “So, uh, what?” he asked, confused.

He hadn’t realised it was possible, but the boy seemed to puff up even further in righteous anger, his chest swelling as he stepped to the side and gestured at the bucket with forceful jabs of his finger. “So you just go around spewing your vomit anywhere you can find? Is that it?” he spat, and Woojin’s mind abruptly decided to imagine smoke gushing out of the boy’s ears as he ranted. “I always knew you heathens had no respect, but come _on_ – this is unacceptable.”

“Did you just call me a heathen?” Woojin said slowly, more baffled than ever. This boy was clearly smoking something extremely potent and was most likely a dangerous, unpredictable individual. He had to get out of there and find Seongwoo, fast.

The boy closed his eyes and took a deep breath, as if praying for patience. “Look, that is my _shrine_. You just desecrated my _shrine_. Do you understand that?” he said slowly and clearly, as if Woojin was the one in need of clarity in his life. “Clean it up or I will curse your entire family. I swear it. And your dog.”

Woojin burst into disbelieving laughter. He wasn’t drunk enough for this shit, to be honest. His head was still hurting, and all he really wanted to do was to get back to his dorm and crawl into bed after a good, cold shower.

“I don’t even have a dog, dumbass,” he said flatly once his chuckles had died away, because he was this close to losing his patience with this random boy who had decided to play a really lousy prank on him for reasons unknown. “Anyway, this hasn’t exactly been a great night for me, and my friend is probably looking for me right now, so –”

“This is _not_ ,” the boy said softly, “a _joke_.”

Before Woojin could even formulate a response, he was roughly pulled forward and then slammed back into the wall just hard enough to knock the breath from his lungs – and okay, he was definitely alarmed now. Not only by Pink Boy’s hidden reserves of inhuman strength, but the fact that those dark eyes were suddenly glowing gold in the most unnatural way possible, like a lightbulb was shining strongly out from behind the boy’s pupils.

 _Heathen. Shrine._ Woojin swiftly did some realignment of the situation in his mind. Shrines were for gods or something, weren’t they?

He wasn’t particularly religious or anything, but somehow he had a bad feeling that he had screwed up.

“You think you’re having a bad night? Try having a bad _century_ ,” the god-boy snapped, “and then to top it off, try having some drunk idiot decide to puke all over your only shrine in the entire world, of all places.”

“Um, I’m sorry?” Woojin cleared his throat nervously, hoping he wasn’t about to be smote dead right where he stood. “I guess I thought it was like, a small trashcan or something? Sorry, bad excuse. I mean, I’ll clean it up – right now, right this moment.”

The god-boy stared hard at him, pink lips tugging down at the corners in a distrustful frown. Slowly, his fingers uncurled from the now-crumpled fabric of Woojin’s shirt, and he took a small step back. _Go forth_ , the minute movement said. _Go forth and cleanse my shrine._

Warily, like the god-boy was a wild animal that might attack at the first careless move he made, Woojin stepped carefully over to the small bucket, not quite daring to take his eyes off the hard-eyed god scrutinising his every move. It wasn’t until he actually had the bucket – sorry, _shrine_ – in his hands that he realised something very odd.

“This is, uh, a KFC bucket,” he said blankly, lifting said bucket to eye level for a better look and pointedly ignoring the subtle slosh of liquid from within. “Your shrine is a KFC bucket?”

The frown grew marginally wider, and infinitely more dangerous. “Do you have a problem with that?”

“Um, _no_ , not at all,” Woojin spluttered hastily. “I was just, you know, wondering. I mean, I’ve never met a god before, so I wouldn’t know what’s normal and what’s not. If you like KFC buckets then, uh, good for you! KFC is great; I love fried chicken.”

The god-boy seemed to perk up at that, his eyes widening, seeming to sparkle even though the threatening golden glow in them had faded. “Really?” he said, sounding rather pleased.

Moving to empty the bucket in a nearby drain, Woojin peered back over his shoulder in confusion at the odd response. “Well, I don’t think it’s possible to dislike fried chicken,” he said slowly, wondering exactly how the conversation had come to this.

The sparkle increased visibly, a very faint shimmer wafting about the large pink sweater, like ghostly fireflies darting to and fro. The god-boy was smiling now, puffed up with satisfaction rather than anger, and Woojin felt absurdly charmed by that tilted smirk. There was probably some sort of holy regulation out there saying that it wasn’t possible to be a god without being inordinately good-looking.

“Well, you may call me Jihoon,” the god-boy said suddenly, with a tone so imperious that Woojin would have taken insult had it not come from the mouth of an actual deity. “I’m the god of fried chicken.”

That was not something Woojin – or anyone, he suspected – had ever expected to hear out loud, and there was a long moment of silence as Jihoon flashed an almost eager smile and Woojin tried to decide how best to respond to that declaration.

He settled with a bout of coughing – loudly and repeatedly, mostly to cover up the laughter threatening to burst from his chest that he suspected would not be well-received by the self-proclaimed god of fried chicken.

Still, he couldn’t help asking, “What does that even mean? Do you bless people with more fried chicken every time they make offerings at your shrine or something?”

Jihoon’s brows furrowed. “What do you mean? Why would I bless people with fried chicken?”

“I mean, let’s say I make an offering to the god of protection. I should end up being more protected from bad stuff, right?” Woojin said, raising his brows. “So by the same logic, if I make an offering to you, do I get blessed with fried chicken?”

“Uh, _no_. Why on earth would I do that?” Jihoon snorted, sounding for all the world like he thought Woojin might be mentally deficient. “You’re supposed to offer _me_ fried chicken. Fried chicken is _my_ thing.”

“Then –” Woojin shook his head in puzzlement. “Then what do I get from offering you fried chicken?”

Jihoon shrugged. “Depends on my mood. Sometimes I might bless people with luck or fortune. Depends on the chicken as well – I cursed someone once because she left me her stupid half-eaten drumstick. She stepped on a nail and got tetanus.”

Woojin’s eyes widened slowly. “I see,” he said carefully. “You sound pretty powerful.”

Suddenly conscious of the bucket still in his hands, he looked around dumbly for a moment for something to wipe it clean with. Finally, he sighed and heroically sacrificed the shirt right off his back for use as a rag. The things he would do to avoid being cursed.

“It’s whatever. It comes with the god territory.” With a careless shrug, Jihoon plopped down onto the ground, leaning his back against the wall with his knees drawn up to his chest, looking for all the world like a kid who had wandered a little too far from home. The sparkle had faded, and he looked very human and very small.

“Not a lot of people believe in me though,” he said, quieter this time as he looked up at Woojin, who was wiping every nook and cranny of the bucket carefully like his life depended on it.

Woojin looked over at him. “I think that’s an understatement,” he said, a little more frankly than he had intended, but Jihoon only laughed.

“Yeah, hence the singular shrine,” he said dryly. “I get pretty protective of it. Sorry if I scared you earlier. I wouldn’t really have cursed you, you know. Probably.”

Woojin cocked his head slightly, allowing a tentative smile to peek through. “Sorry for, uh, desecrating it in the first place. I should have –”

“Woojin? Hey, Woojin! _There_ you are.” The sudden sound of Seongwoo’s voice was accompanied by said man grabbing Woojin by the shoulders and tugging him around to give him an anxious once-over. “Why did you take your shirt off? And why are you holding a KFC bucket? Wow, you’re so wasted.”

Woojin blinked. “No, I –” He turned back, mouth half-open, but the place Jihoon had occupied a second ago was now empty, leaving only his shrine still clutched uselessly in Woojin’s hands. “Yeah, um, about this – well, I found it here. Let me just put it back.” Ducking out of Seongwoo’s grasp, he carefully replaced the bucket by the wall.

“ _Okay_ ,” Seongwoo said, drawing out the ‘o’ as his eyebrows disappeared behind his bangs. “Let’s just get you home, kid.”

As Woojin swung his leg over Seongwoo’s bike, as he adjusted his seat and flipped down the visor of his helmet, he flashed another quick glance towards the alley by the club. Maybe it was a trick of the light, or a shifting shadow from a passing car, or maybe he really saw the pale silhouette of a pink-clad teen crouched over a clean KFC bucket – even if he did disappear between one blink and the next.


	2. Chapter 2

The next afternoon found Woojin sitting at his dining table with two boxes of fried chicken in front of him as he tried to summon the god of fried chicken.

It probably wasn’t the smartest thing he had ever done, but he had woken up with the distinct memory of having emptied his guts into a god’s shrine the previous night, and he was fairly sure that alcohol didn’t cause hallucinations. Not the amount that he had drunk, anyway.

The extra box was open before the seat opposite him, the lovely scent of batter and chicken wafting out into the air, and the level of stupidity he felt as he opened his mouth to speak into thin air could not be adequately described with words.

“Um, Jihoon?” he said tentatively. “God of fried chicken? This is for you – like a friendly offering, I guess. Or an apology, for yesterday.”

Silence.

Woojin waited for a moment longer, disappointment tugging at his gut with every passing second, and then rolled his eyes. He definitely felt dumb now. Whatever, he’d just have extra chicken to eat then.

He had just taken the first bite of his own chicken when someone strolled out of the kitchen like he had been there the whole time – someone who was certainly not his flatmate. Someone with pink hair and a peach sweater, just as over-sized as the night before.

“Hi,” Jihoon said brightly, pulling out a chair and plopping down into it. “Fancy seeing you again, boy who desecrated my only shrine.”

Woojin stared – he couldn’t help it. It was just bizarre, seeing Jihoon in the light of day and not through a lens of alcohol-induced suffering. He couldn’t imagine how he had ever mistaken the god-boy for a human, not with the faint shimmer that followed him wherever he went, an actual bona fide _aura_ , like a constant mirage or a barely-visible forcefield.

Jihoon raised a questioning brow. “What?”

“Nothing. I mean –” Woojin blinked, wondering if he sounded as stupid as he felt. “Well, your hair is pink.”

“And you have a snaggletooth,” Jihoon said matter-of-factly. “Thanks, Captain Obvious.”

Woojin sighed. “No, I mean, your hair wasn’t pink last night.” Privately, he wondered if all gods were so infuriating.

“Park Woojin,” Jihoon said with an exaggerated sigh. “I am a _god_. And how do I know your name? Please refer to my previous sentence. Now, do you have any more questions, or can I enjoy your offering in peace?”

Woojin made a motioning gesture with his hand. “Sorry, you can eat,” he muttered, almost regretting his stupid offering already. Jihoon didn’t exactly seem to be in a blessing kind of mood – not that Woojin had summoned him just for a blessing, but he hadn’t summoned him so he could experience what it felt like to have lunch with a particularly bratty cousin either.

For all his godly status, Jihoon ate his fried chicken exactly like a teen who was still going through puberty – voraciously, messily and extremely thoroughly. Woojin chewed distractedly as he watched the god-boy lick his oily fingers with more gusto than should be possible for someone whose diet probably consisted solely of fried chicken.

He was sparkling again, Woojin realised, the literal sparkle of a satisfied god.

Jihoon flashed him a lazy smile, and the twinkle in those dark eyes made Woojin abruptly light-headed. He felt a little like puking again, but it might just have been the remnants of last night’s intoxication making itself known.

“Consider yourself blessed,” Jihoon said sweetly. “That was some pretty good chicken, Park Woojin.”

“Don’t you ever get sick of fried chicken?” Woojin wondered curiously, and he winced only a little at the utter distaste that flashed across Jihoon’s face at his admittedly-insensitive question.

“Maybe when you get sick of dancing,” Jihoon said pointedly, and yeah, point taken.

Grasping about for another topic of conversation before he could accidentally put his foot into his mouth again and piss off a god, Woojin asked somewhat hastily, “So do you, uh, do this a lot? Appear to humans and just expose your existence?”

The look Jihoon shot him was calculating. “Only if they empty their stomachs into my shrine,” he said coolly, as he pushed his chair back and sauntered over to Woojin’s couch. It was hard to tell if he was actually miffed at the memory or was genuinely as nonchalant as he seemed, and Woojin felt vaguely stressed out by that fact.

Jihoon seemed not to notice or care as he continued on, “But I was also pretty bored. It’s not like I’m drowning in prayers and offerings or anything.” He gave a delicate sigh at the unthinkable insult, accompanied by an impressively cutting eye-roll.

A sudden thought struck Woojin at that, and he twisted around to stare at Jihoon. “You won’t, like, _disappear_ or fade out of existence if people stop believing in you, will you? I mean, I believe in you now.” He cast an anxious glance over at the god-boy, as if expecting to be able to see the rough leather of his sofa right through Jihoon’s still very-much-corporeal body.

Jihoon raised a brow in the most withering manner possible and scoffed, “Don’t be ridiculous. What kind of god would I be if I blew away with the wind just because no one believed in me? I’m perfectly capable of believing in myself, thank you very much.”

He paused thoughtfully then, lip uncurling and brow smoothing out, and Woojin held his breath. “Still, having believers is always nice,” Jihoon admitted dreamily, his eyes impossibly soft. “I do so enjoy the offerings.”

The whiplash was strong with this one, Woojin thought. Barely half an hour in and he was already exhausted from swinging rapidly between mild fear of being turned into some sort of bird and groundless infatuation every time those brown eyes sparkled unreasonably bright.

Gods were dangerous indeed.

“Well,” he coughed. “I kinda have to get going. Saturday is gaming day with my friends, so –” It wasn’t an excuse if it was the truth, but he stood awkwardly anyway, waiting for Jihoon to make the next move.

The god-boy only glanced at him from beneath his lashes, his smile far too knowing for Woojin’s comfort. “Go on then. Have fun,” he said encouragingly.

Woojin blinked as stoically as he could manage, feeling all the hairs on his arms stand on end at that disturbingly foxy expression, one that certainly didn’t belong on a face as cherubic as Jihoon’s. “Um, okay then. Bye, I guess. If you’re staying here, that is. Which I guess you are,” he said choppily, concluding lamely only as he began to close his apartment door on a serenely-smiling Jihoon.

At least Jihoon was only the god of fried chicken, and not the god of chaos or thievery or messy houses.

Woojin only understood that smile when he won every single match he played that day, even against Daehwi, whose fingers were white-knuckled over the controller, his head a little too close to exploding in utter disbelief.

“What is this _sorcery_?” he demanded in a half-shriek, eyes huge and mouth gaping.

Woojin smirked. Definitely blessed.

“I made an offering to the god of fried chicken earlier. I guess he liked it,” he said airily, and promptly got a cushion to the head for his trouble.

Daniel, Woojin’s flatmate, was humming far too enthusiastically in his room when Woojin returned to their dorm, but a certain god-boy was nowhere to be found. Not that Woojin was surprised – it was hard enough to pin people down, much less a god – but he couldn’t help feeling just a tiny bit let down anyway.

Then he walked into his room, saw Jihoon tucked snugly under _his_ covers, with _his_ laptop propped open on _his_ bed, and promptly did a double-take hard enough to bash his elbow on the side of his closet.

“What happened?” Daniel called.

“Nothing, I tripped!” Woojin somehow managed to force the words out of his throat despite the way it was threatening to close up, turning him into an awkward, sputtering wreck each time he was in Jihoon’s presence.

Maybe it was fear, or maybe it wasn’t.

“What are you doing here?” he demanded, albeit in a slightly panicked whisper.

Jihoon’s gaze flicked up to take in Woojin’s appalled expression, and an immensely unimpressed look crossed his face. “Are you saying that I’m not allowed to be here?” he said coolly. “I’m commandeering your room. What else would I be doing?”

Woojin shook his head speechlessly for a moment. “But you – I mean, you’re a god,” he said stupidly. “And you don’t even usually show yourself to people. Not that I’m complaining, but I’m just confused. I don’t understand. Why are you even, you know, _here_?”

Jihoon sighed, looking for all the world as if Woojin were the trespasser and not himself. “Look, it’s been almost two hundred years since I last spoke to a human. He got gored to death by a wild boar because he was a disrespectful imbecile who thought that just because he slaughtered chickens for me every day, he could make me some sort of pet who existed only to bless him with fortune.”

“Oh,” Woojin croaked. It was definitely fear.

“But,” Jihoon continued, a little more brightly this time, with another heart-stopping smile at Woojin, “you don’t seem like that type of human, so I’ll probably stick around for a while. I’ve missed all these mortal shenanigans.”

Woojin really didn’t know how to feel about that. On the one hand, there was something almost scarily magnetic about Jihoon, the kind that made his heart beat double-time at every blink of those doe eyes. On the other hand, Jihoon was a god. A god that caused people to get tetanus if they crossed him.

There was only one appropriate answer in this situation.

“Well, stay as long as you like then,” Woojin said, his nervous smile tugging uncomfortably at his cheeks.

Jihoon beamed with a child’s excitement, the faint aura about him flashing brightly for just a second before subsiding once more. “I will, thanks,” he said sweetly, and right at that moment, Woojin had the completely irrational thought that he wouldn’t mind if Jihoon stayed forever.

“In the meantime, I think you should move my shrine indoors,” Jihoon said, in a tone that could only be described as bossy. “I’m sure you can imagine what happens every time it rains, not to mention when drunk humans stumble across it at night.” His smirk was slyly amused, and Woojin immediately took back any wayward thoughts about forever.

The weird thing was that Woojin really did end up feeling like he was living with a pet. Not that he would ever say that to Jihoon, of course.

It was all very cat-like, he thought. Sometimes Jihoon disappeared for days on end, up to his own devices, but Woojin made sure to fill the bucket in the corner of his room with fried chicken every couple of days anyway. Sometimes he spent hours in the afternoon entertaining the god-boy with games and stories. Sometimes Jihoon just sat there and watched him work on his assignments with an intensity that was unnerving.

“Don’t you want to go out and meet new people?” Woojin asked one day. “I could introduce you to my friends. Or even Daniel hyung. He lives here too, you know.”

Jihoon didn’t even look up from the book in his hands, some disgustingly thick textbook that Woojin couldn’t actually remember opening before in his life. “You’re in no position to try and dictate what I do and don’t do,” he said calmly, in a way that would probably have scared the life out of Woojin just a couple of weeks before. But he was familiar enough with the god-boy’s various tones by now to identify the pouty grumble hidden in those words, and he huffed in response.

“Well, it was just a suggestion,” he said airily, turning back to his laptop.

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Jihoon straighten and set the book down. “I’m a god, Woojin,” he said patiently. “I may enjoy being universally adored, but I’m not particularly interested in meeting other humans face-to-face. It’s nice to know that you care though.”

And yeah, that was definitely a smirk he heard in the god-boy’s voice.

“Hey, who says that I care?” Woojin protested, fighting the smile tugging at his lips. “I just thought you might be bored hanging out with only me for the next – I don’t know, however long you’re staying here for. How long is ‘a while’ anyway?”

There was the sound of a page flipping, and then silence for a full five seconds. “A while is however long I would like it to be. Maybe for as long as you have the money for fried chicken,” Jihoon said, just a little too casually. Woojin’s eyes narrowed.

“But I’m thinking a decade at least. Or two.”

Out in the living room, Daniel jumped at the sound of an unholy screech of blended horror and disbelief coming from Woojin’s room. The same room that had recently been emitting an unbearably strong smell of fried chicken if the window wasn’t left open during the day.

He sighed. _Teenagers_.


	3. Chapter 3

“Woojin!”

It was the notable sound of distress in Daniel’s voice that made Woojin hurry over to his doorway and poke his head out of his room, brows furrowed in concern.

“What?” he called, frowning at his flatmate, who was standing in the doorway of his own room looking lost.

“Have you seen my lip tint?” the taller boy demanded, wringing his hands about in so much distress that Woojin could only stare in disbelief.

“Uh,” he said slowly. “No?” In the first place, he hadn’t even known that Daniel wore lip tint. And secondly, why would he ever want to take _Daniel’s_ anyway?

“Ugh.” Daniel rubbed his eyes with the heel of his palm and groaned. “I left it on my table before going for class, but now it’s gone, and no one’s even been in here. I mean, not that I’m accusing _you_ of taking my stuff or anything. Never mind. Thanks, Woojin.”

Woojin blinked in confusion as Daniel promptly turned on his heel and disappeared back into his room, presumably to turn it upside down in the continued search for his missing lip tint. Something odd was nagging at the back of his mind – something about what Daniel had just said – but he couldn’t quite put his finger on it by staring at Daniel’s door.

With a shake of his head, he relegated the curious case of Daniel’s missing lip tint to the back of his mind and returned to his own homework – statistics, the absolute bane of his entire university experience thus far.

The incident only popped back to the forefront of his mind when he turned around about an hour later to find Jihoon sprawled across his bed with one of Woojin’s painstakingly-constructed model planes in his godly hands. Because of _course_ , who else would have had access to Daniel’s room besides Woojin?

“Hey,” he said, getting up and shoving lightly at the god-boy to make room for him on his own bed, before plucking the plane right out of Jihoon’s hands. “Did you take Daniel hyung’s lip tint from his table?”

Jihoon’s gaze trailed after the model plane, a pout slowly forming on his lips. “I may have,” he said elusively. “What’s it to you?”

Woojin darted an almost nervous glance at the door, as if expecting Daniel to come crashing through it accusingly at any moment. “You can’t just go around _taking_ people’s stuff whenever you like,” he hissed, appalled. “If it doesn’t belong to you, then you have to get permission first.”

Jihoon’s nonchalant expression turned into a cool glare, his aura shimmering slightly in a decidedly offended manner. “But I’m a god,” he said, his words coming out just a little more whiny than imperious. And anyway, Woojin had heard _that_ particular excuse far too many times for it to convince him of anything anymore.

“Yeah, well, while you’re living here, you have to live by my rules,” he said flatly. The distinct echo of his mother’s words coming from his own mouth made him pause for a discomfited moment, but Jihoon at least seemed to accept it, no matter how begrudgingly.

“I don’t _have_ to do anything,” the god-boy sniffed dismissively, “but I suppose I can accommodate your human sensitivities.”

Woojin decided to take that as a win.

“So…you’re going to give Daniel hyung’s lip tint back to him, right?” he said encouragingly, digging his toes under Jihoon’s thigh just to be annoying.

Jihoon squirmed away, one corner of his mouth pulling down as he seemed to consider the request seriously. “Fine,” he sighed at last, before his gaze flicked back up to meet Woojin’s calculatingly, “but I want chicken.”

Woojin smirked, resisting the sudden urge to reach out and run his fingers through Jihoon’s grey hair. “Since when do you ever _not_ want chicken,” he said dryly, and Jihoon beamed, pleased. “How about we go out to the shop to eat this time? I kind of want to get out of here anyway. I’m sick of all these stupid numbers that don’t make any sense.”

The smile dropped off the god’s face as quickly as it had come, and Woojin sighed internally. He knew that look, and much to his dismay it always preceded a ‘no’.

“I don’t want to. I was playing with your stuff until you interrupted me so rudely,” Jihoon huffed, reaching for the plane that Woojin was still holding. “And anyway, I told you, I hate meeting other humans.” He grunted when Woojin moved his hand, shifting the plane just out of reach.

“I spent hours assembling this. It’s for display _only_ ,” Woojin said determinedly, forcing the breathless words out in spite of Jihoon clambering bodily over him like he thought he was weightless or something. Newsflash, he wasn’t. In fact, he felt denser than he had any right to be, or maybe cuter faces made for lighter impressions.

“I’ll be careful,” Jihoon insisted hotly, reaching for the plane with a dogged look of determination on his face. Woojin gave a startled yelp of pain when the god-boy grabbed hold of his arm and dragged it over to him without the slightest bit of effort, giving Woojin’s shoulder a good twist in the process.

“ _Jihoon_ ,” he hissed, instead of the infinitely more pathetic “ _ow_ ” that was threatening to force its way out of his throat. Jihoon immediately dropped his arm, eyes huge with surprise as he stared down at Woojin’s crumpled expression.

“I’m sorry,” he blurted, and then again, even more flustered, “I’m really, really sorry.” He sank down onto Woojin’s lap with a subdued gulp, hands hovering helplessly over the injured arm while his eyes darted back and forth from Woojin’s face to his shoulder.

Woojin sighed. “It’s fine. Just – hold this. Carefully.” He passed the plane over to Jihoon before massaging at his sore shoulder for a moment – it felt like a simple muscle strain, he figured. Nothing that wouldn’t go away within the next few hours, if that. Jihoon was motionless and heavy in his lap, plane held carefully in the air, like a living statue that had frozen in place out of fear.

“Hey,” Woojin said, grinning lopsidedly. “Relax, it’s not like I’m going to die or anything. I’ll be fine in a moment. Stop looking so dull.” Jihoon really did look decidedly dimmer, his aura swimming with amorphous threads of anxious, smoky grey. Woojin reached out to dig his knuckles into Jihoon’s side and succeeded in eliciting a very aggrieved squeal from the god, which only made him grin even wider.

“Come on. Let’s go and have chicken,” he said softly, setting his hand on Jihoon’s hip and rubbing circles above the waistband of his jeans with his thumb. “You owe me. And no one will talk to you, I promise. Feel free to hate every single human all you want.” He rolled his eyes, unable to keep the indulgent smirk off his face.

Jihoon glared at him, a mutinous spark fizzing back into his aura. “I don’t hate humans. I just hate meeting them,” he grumbled, “but _fine_. Just for today. And only because I feel bad for hurting your pathetic human body.”

“Sure, whatever helps you sleep at night,” Woojin muttered, amused.

He felt sorry for Jihoon sometimes, a god that no one believed in. Deity or not, surely it wasn’t fun to lead what must pretty much be a meaningless existence, reduced to spending his days in a random university student’s dorm room for the sake of some company.

At other times, he was too busy reining in his frustration to feel a single ounce of sympathy for the trespassing god.

One night, he stormed into his room after a long day of classes and an equally gruelling evening of dance, and was almost savagely pleased to find Jihoon perched on his chair, surfing the net for the small, fluffy plushies that he had a particular soft spot for.

“You left the TV switched on all day,” he snapped, stalking over to the god-boy, who looked up at him with that infuriatingly calm gaze of his. “Daniel hyung thought I was the one who didn’t turn it off in the morning. Also, electricity isn’t _free_.”

Jihoon blinked, brows raising in a ‘why are you so mad?’ expression that made Woojin want to screech. “I guess I forgot,” he said with a shrug, turning back to Woojin’s laptop with a definite air of having concluded the conversation.

“No, seriously, this is important,” Woojin growled, wondering whether or not he would be courting death by shutting the laptop in Jihoon’s face and eventually deciding against it. “You know Daniel hyung is starting to think this place is haunted? Stop shifting things around and taking his stuff. We’ve _talked_ about this before.”

Jihoon sighed loudly. “I tend to forget things that are unimportant,” he said, glancing back up at Woojin with a tiny, smug smile playing on his lips that was just _daring_ Woojin to blow up at him.

Woojin took a deep breath, unclenching his fists from his sides. “I wouldn’t call the terms and conditions of you staying here unimportant.”

Jihoon’s motions slowed, his eyes narrowing. “You wouldn’t kick me out,” he said flatly. “You can’t.”

Woojin smirked. “Let me guess – because you’re a god?” He ignored the way Jihoon was halfway through puffing up in anger and continued on, “Maybe I can’t, but I can definitely stop making offerings to you. I can definitely toss your shrine back out onto the street if I feel like it.”

Jihoon stood abruptly, sending the chair rolling off behind him. “You _wouldn’t_ ,” he said lowly, his eyes flashing so bright for a moment that Woojin winced. “Remember, I am perfectly capable of cursing you, Park Woojin. I can make your life hell.”

“Yeah, and that’s the best way to go about making friends, I’m sure. Threatening to curse them every time they do something you don’t like,” Woojin snorted. Setting his backpack down with a thump, he grabbed some clean clothes from his closet before making a beeline for the bathroom without another word. He wasn’t in the mood to hear another threat from Jihoon’s mouth.

Or worse, a denial that they weren’t even friends at all.

He was expecting to come back out to an empty room, or at least a sulking, stormy-faced Jihoon. What he didn’t expect was a reluctantly apologetic god-boy sitting on his bed, legs swinging back and forth, feet brushing the floor with every downward arc.

“I’ll be more careful next time,” Jihoon mumbled sullenly the moment Woojin opened the door.

Woojin actually stopped in his tracks, his jaw dropping open unattractively, until Jihoon glared over at him and demanded, “I know you’re a fool, but could you at least try not to look like one?”

Woojin shook his head, feeling the inopportune urge to snicker. “That,” he said with a small smile, “is the closest you’ve ever come to an apology. I’m impressed.”

Jihoon lips twisted into a scowl, but there wasn’t much heat to it. “Yeah? Well, don’t get used to it.”

“Don’t worry, I’ll be sure to treasure this moment,” Woojin shot back, flopping down onto his chair and spinning idly in place.

Jihoon let out a long breath. “You humans worry about far too many things.” He sounded vaguely disapproving of that fact, and really, it was probably his strange combination of effortless charm, childlike naiveté and baseless disdain that so endeared him to Woojin.

“Mortal lives are difficult. Not that you would know, living your privileged godly life,” Woojin groaned dramatically. “Although I have to admit, things have been going strangely well for me recently, probably thanks to your interference. You have no idea how weird it is that my bus always comes exactly as I reach the bus stop. It’s creepy, is what it is.”

Jihoon hummed a contented little tune at that. “Sounds like whichever god’s looking out for you deserves a bit more appreciation.”

Woojin burst into a bout of choppy laughter, and the triumphant, shameless smirk that Jihoon directed towards him dazzled him in exactly the same way it had that first drunken night in the alley. Something in his stomach lurched, then settled, and he knew that he was grinning back with a slightly dazed expression on his face that Jihoon would surely call ‘stupid’.

Not that it mattered, but the god was still, undeniably, the most beautiful being he had ever laid eyes on in all nineteen years of his life, and he didn’t think that any amount of exposure to Jihoon was going to change that.

True, Jihoon might just be his most maddening, self-entitled, self-absorbed friend of all time, prone to temper tantrums and threats of eternal damnation, but Woojin was pretty certain that he wouldn’t change any of it for the world anyway.


	4. Chapter 4

Woojin felt a little like tearing up as he stared at the letter A printed neatly on his transcript for that semester, but it may also have been because he hadn’t blinked for at least a minute straight. He could feel his jaw hanging open stupidly, because surely this was a dream?

His door opened, and the voice of the god who might as well have become his second flatmate sounded behind him. “What are you looking at?”

Woojin turned to look at Jihoon, who looked unreasonably adorable with his arms wrapped around a stuffed penguin that he had basically forced Woojin to buy for him after seeing it online. The sight made his heart sink suddenly anyway.

“Uh, I got an A for one of my mods,” he said slowly. “It’s my first A ever.”

Jihoon raised a brow. “So the long face is because…?” he prodded, casting a quick glance over at his empty shrine before sitting down on the edge of Woojin’s bed.

“I don’t know,” Woojin muttered, and managed to hold Jihoon’s quizzical gaze for about a second before breaking and confessing, “I mean, I guess I was just wondering if this A was because of you. Did I only do well because I’ve been feeding you all this time?” He shook his head, confused about the entire situation, and himself most of all. Honestly, it wasn’t like he had ever cared that much about his grades in the first place.

Jihoon frowned at him, raising a hand to scratch at the back of his head in a manner that screamed discomfort. “Are you not happy with the A?” he asked, and he looked so uncharacteristically uncertain that Woojin felt like dropping the whole topic all together.

“No, I mean, it’s not that,” Woojin sighed, rubbing a hand over his eyes and wondering how best to explain the concept of the pride that came from one’s own achievements to a god. “I just feel like maybe I don’t deserve that grade if I wouldn’t have gotten it without your help. It feels unfair, you know?”

Jihoon cocked his head to the side ever so slightly, and the inhuman stillness of his stance was making Woojin regret starting this conversation at all. “I don’t get it,” Jihoon said, and his tone was flat, possibly inching towards annoyed. “It’s a transaction. Don’t all of you humans love transactions? You gave that person money and they gave you this penguin. You make me offerings and I bless you. What’s wrong with that?”

Woojin closed his eyes and held up a hand. “You know what, it’s fine. I appreciate everything you’ve done for me, really,” he said firmly, because he liked Jihoon too much to start a squabble over something so stupid.

“You’re welcome, I guess?”

Woojin’s eyes snapped open to find Daniel standing in his open doorway, staring at him in confusion, and possibly some worry for his mental wellbeing.

Swallowing his disappointment, Woojin forced a smile. “Sorry, I was just, uh, talking to myself,” he said lamely. “Did I bother you, hyung?”

Daniel opened his mouth, shut it, and then opened it again. “No, but I’m supposed to tell you that practice has been changed to four tomorrow.” It was almost amusing how torn the poor guy looked, like he couldn’t decide if he wanted to respect Woojin’s privacy or demand to know exactly what the hell had been going on with his flatmate for the past semester.

“I got an A this sem,” Woojin said, taking pity on Daniel, his smile quirking into something more genuine as he pointed to his laptop.

Daniel’s eyes widened, delight dripping from every pore as he bounded into the room and swept an unprepared Woojin up into a tight hug. “That’s amazing, Woojin! I can count on my fingers how many A’s _I’ve_ gotten in three years,” he said with a sheepish laugh.

Woojin smiled weakly. “Yay,” he said with as much enthusiasm as he could muster, keeping his smile up until Daniel trundled cheerfully out of the room, looking like all his worries had been wiped clean simply by virtue of Woojin’s superior grades.

“Ugh,” Jihoon snorted, shutting the door firmly behind Daniel and shooting Woojn a dirty look. “Why is he always so happy?”

Woojin shrugged, not quite sure if he was in the mood to banter with the god at the moment. Jihoon could get obnoxious at times, and rarely did he ever realise it – part of the perils of being a god and never actually needing to develop social skills, Woojin supposed. Most of the time, he accepted it as part of Jihoon’s contrary charm, but sometimes it could get grating.

“Hey,” Jihoon said, more sharply this time, like perhaps he suspected Woojin had gone deaf. “Park Woojin.”

“What?” Woojin snapped, allowing his exasperation to bleed into his tone. Long gone were the days when he had feared Jihoon’s divine status, not when the god-boy had said time and time again that Woojin was his favourite mortal in the entire world.

Admittedly, most of those times had been when he was eating fried chicken offered to him by Woojin, but still – surely it counted for something.

“What’s wrong with you? You don’t want my blessings anymore? Is that it?” Jihoon demanded, and his voice was as hard as the expression on his face. “I suppose I should apologise for the hardships I’ve caused you with my _blessings_ then.” He was almost spitting by the end, his aura an angry, twisting shimmer about him.

Woojin stood, turning on Jihoon with his fists clenched by his sides. “Stop acting like I asked for your blessings, okay? You’re a god. You’ll never understand what it’s like to be human. You’ll never understand what it’s like to – to have to work hard for everything. Your biggest worry is whether I’ll buy fried chicken for you tomorrow, or whether I’ll get you that toy you’ve been eyeing for the past week. You just don’t _get it_ , Jihoon.”

They stared at each other, Woojin still breathing hard from his outburst, Jihoon wide-eyed and frozen, more shocked than Woojin had ever seen him. But then, Woojin had shocked even himself with that tiny rant he had gone off on.

“You can’t just come in here and impose on me and change my life and expect everything to be okay,” he said tiredly. “I like you, Jihoon, I really do. We get along most of the time, and you’re a _god_ , which is pretty damn cool, but waving your fingers and making everything great with your magical powers isn’t always the answer.”

“I’ve been _blessing_ you, you ungrateful wretch,” Jihoon snarled, thrusting the stuffed penguin into Woojin’s chest repeatedly with every word he emphasised. “And you call that imposing? I really hope you have a nice life when I’m gone, Park Woojin. You humans are impossible. A blessing for an offering – what more do you _want_ from me?”

“I don’t know,” Woojin admitted, throwing up his hands in defeat. He didn’t even know how they had gone from discussing his possibly dishonestly-gained grade to, well, whatever this was.

Jihoon’s sneer was the meanest Woojin had ever seen from him. “I’ll leave you to your hard work then, shall I?”

Woojin watched silently as the god-boy moved to the other side of Woojin’s bed and set the stuffed penguin carefully down on his pillow. It wasn’t until Jihoon gave the toy a fond pat on the head that he finally realised exactly what was happening.

He lurched forward, clumsy with anxiety, and grabbed Jihoon’s hand. “Wait,” he said, his accent thickening the way it always did when his emotions managed to get the better of him. “Don’t go. Please.”

Jihoon looked down at where Woojin’s hand was wrapped around his, and for a terrible moment, Woojin thought that the god was going to disappear anyway, leaving him clinging on to empty air. Instead Jihoon looked back up at him silently, disbelief and hurt brimming in his eyes.

“Why?” he said simply. “Do you even want me around?”

Woojin let out a soft breath. “Of course I do,” he said quietly. “Look, it’s not that I don’t appreciate your blessings. It’s just that it makes me feel bad sometimes, like I’m getting a free ride, or things I don’t deserve. Like you said, it’s all about the transaction with us. That grade I got? I don’t think I put in enough work to warrant me getting an A – seeing it makes me feel guilty.”

Jihoon blinked once, twice. “Then what do you want from me?” He tugged his hand out of Woojin’s grip and ran his fingers through his hair, frustration flashing in his eyes. “I can’t do anything else. Do you know how lonely it is when no one believes in you unless you reveal yourself to them? All people ever wanted were blessings, or to show me off like some circus exhibit.”

His gaze lowered, lashes sweeping downwards in a combination of exhaustion and shyness. “Except you.”

Woojin felt the last of his defences crumble at Jihoon’s unexpected vulnerability. Then again, he had never been able to deny the god-boy anything.

“I don’t need anything from you. I don’t care about your blessings,” he said firmly. “I just like having you as my friend, okay? I like the way you gobble up my offerings like chickens are going extinct tomorrow. I like the way your eyes literally glow like a lantern when I say good things about fried chicken. I like how sarcastic and annoying you are sometimes. I like that you will never, ever let me live down the fact that we met when I drunk-vomited into your stupid bucket of a shrine.”

“Don’t call my shrine stupid,” Jihoon interrupted, but he was smiling, eyes curving into soft half-moons as he stared at Woojin. The ghostly fireflies were back, darting and glowing all about and resting in Jihoon’s brown curls.

Woojin grinned. “I like you because you’re _you_ ,” he finished. “I’ll be your friend if you’ll be mine. That’s a good transaction, I think.”

Jihoon closed his eyes and took a deep breath. “Yeah, that sounds good,” he said, and if his voice caught in his throat the same way Woojin’s had way back when, neither of them said anything about it.

“And,” Woojin added, with the faintest hint of amusement in his tone, “I’ll always believe in you.” He reached out to catch Jihoon’s hand again, and squeezed it lightly.

This quietude, this affectionate comfort had never quite been in their repertoire of interactions. They were more about the sardonic jibes and the tolerant amusement – but sometimes something had to give before the next step could be taken.

“Honestly,” Woojin continued, sweeping Jihoon’s stuffed penguin up into his arms and squeezing it until the god-boy wrestled it back with an annoyed huff, “I really think you should try meeting my friends. You literally just said that you were _lonely_!” His voice rose in volume the moment he saw Jihoon open his mouth to protest, because this was a good idea. Really.

“I also just said that every other human I’ve met sucked,” Jihoon snorted.

Woojin slapped his forehead with his palm in mock despair. “Don’t be dumb. I’m not going to introduce you as a god. If you just do something about that aura and stop talking about blessings, you can pass off as a human just fine. We’ll tell them you’re my childhood friend or my cousin or something, who’s here to visit me for the summer. It’ll be great!”

Jihoon’s nose wrinkled in distaste. “You mean people are going to think we’re related?” he said, appalled.

“That’s seriously the only thing you got out of everything I just said?” Woojin demanded.

Jihoon grinned. “Maybe.” He gave Woojin a few seconds to get his groan of despair out of the way before continuing, just a little more seriously, “How about the fact that I don’t eat anything other than fried chicken?”

Woojin waved his hand dismissively. “Who cares? We’ll just make something up. No one’s going to realise that just because you only eat fried chicken, you must definitely be the god of fried chicken,” he scoffed.

“You’re annoying.” Jihoon grimaced.

“No, I’m a fantastic friend,” Woojin corrected firmly. “Let’s start with Daniel.”

Jihoon goggled at him in surprise. “Now?” the god squeaked, and Woojin might have rolled around on the floor at the sheer amount of _cuteness_ emanating from Jihoon if he’d had less self-control.

Instead, he rolled his eyes and said dryly, “No, next year. Of _course_ I mean now. Are you visible? Remember how I almost had a heart attack that time you just walked between us, except Daniel couldn’t see you at all?”

“Well, it was funny,” Jihoon said, faux sweetness dripping from his words.

“Shut up,” Woojin muttered. “Just – come on. It’ll be fine.” He grabbed Jihoon’s hand and pulled the god-boy towards the door, and the way Jihoon dragged his feet reluctantly behind him sent a surge of warmth through his chest.

Pulling his bedroom door open, Woojin called, “Hyung?”

Jihoon tugged at his hand lightly. “I’m nervous,” he whispered, and then cleared his throat. “But just a little bit. Barely at all.”

Woojin turned and flashed him a grin, raising a brow as he stared Jihoon right in the eye.

“Don’t be. I’m right here with you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was supposed to be a slightly cracky one-shot, I swear, but the whole thing just ran away with me cos leaving it at just the first chapter felt weirdly incomplete. I really did try to avoid all the strange, mildly angsty conflict but in the end I just gave up and went with it. To whoever submitted this prompt, I hope you got some entertainment value out of this!
>
>> (noragami au) jihoon is an almost forgotten god. one night, a drunk boy named woojin vomits on his tiny shrine, thinking it's a trash can. jihoon is determined to make him clean up the vomit, or he'd curse his entire family. and his dog.


End file.
